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Topic: Coder Transparency - Bandages (Read 2325 times)

The following represents a working feature branch based largely on a discussion staff-side over the last three months, but including recent posts by players in the code forum. It is currently in testing and may go out as early as next week. This does not represent the totality of the changes, only the ones that are likely to make it into help files and other player facing documentation.

Bandages are going to undergo a change from instant heal to a healing affect that increases the likelihood of healing happening on tick and how much is healed.

The considerations on healing will be how injured the patient is, how skilled the healer is, and what quality the bandage is. The intersection of these values will be used to determine the duration the affect stays in place and what benefits the bandage gives.

Looking at someone will indicate if they have been bandaged with a message after their description. Assessing someone will do the same but also relate to characters with the bandage skill how effective the bandage is and roughly how long until it will last.

Bandage affects will not stack. Applying a bandage to someone that already has one will remove the old bandage first. Good if you're applying a better bandage or by a more skilled healer than the prior healer. Not good, otherwise.

Vigorous activity such as fighting, running, climbing, falling, etc... will lower the duration of the bandage, but not its effectiveness.

Anyone will be able to attempt to use a bandage on a patient, but only those with the 'bandage' skill on their skill-list will be able to advance from failures. Failure when bandaging will result in damage that decreases as the skill of the healer goes up, to the point that it may be 1 hit point at the highest levels.

Additionally almost any injury will be capable of being bandaged.

Finally, using assess on bandage items will relate to the user how it matches up against their skill, letting them know if the bandage is overkill for their ability or if it is wanting. There is always a benefit to using the best bandage that you can acquire, offsetting the difficulty of treating more serious wounds, but ultimately your character's skill will come into play in determining just how much aid is given.

One thing I wasn't quite clear about from your description, is the benefit of any given bandaging limited by the minimum between the bandage quality and the bandager's skill? Or would a master bandager using a novice-level bandage still expect to grant more benefit than an apprentice bandager with the same novice-level bandage?

Sadly, yes. So long as you're willing to stick your hands into the squirming guts of someone on death's door without really knowing what you're doing, death by bandage will still be a thing. The higher the healer's bandage skill, the less chance of doing damage and the less damage will be done, however, so we should see less of this.

You mentioned that bandaging will be possible at "any level" to allow for a regeneration effect to be applied.

Is the 55% no-heal threshold still going to be a thing? Like, we may still need to 'sleep off' some higher damage counts, its just that we can bandage after the first "solid" hit and either fail for skill, or succeed for higher standing regen?

One thing I wasn't quite clear about from your description, is the benefit of any given bandaging limited by the minimum between the bandage quality and the bandager's skill? Or would a master bandager using a novice-level bandage still expect to grant more benefit than an apprentice bandager with the same novice-level bandage?

There are two primary concerns related to the affect of being bandaged.

The duration of the bandage, which is mostly a constant but gets a slight boost from skilled healer's.

The effectiveness of the bandage, which is the lower of the quality of the bandage or the healer's skill.

Bandage quality is tied to the success of applying the bandage so it is always beneficial to use the highest quality bandage you can acquire even if its quality outstrips your skill.

You mentioned that bandaging will be possible at "any level" to allow for a regeneration effect to be applied.

Is the 55% no-heal threshold still going to be a thing? Like, we may still need to 'sleep off' some higher damage counts, its just that we can bandage after the first "solid" hit and either fail for skill, or succeed for higher standing regen?

All but the smallest of injuries can be bandaged, everything else is fair game.

Wounds so serious they require sleep can be healed by bandages, but only if the quality of the bandage and the skill of the healer are high enough.

Being bandaged will halt bleeding out even if the bandage affect is not strong enough to let the patient heal while awake.

Sadly, yes. So long as you're willing to stick your hands into the squirming guts of someone on death's door without really knowing what you're doing, death by bandage will still be a thing. The higher the healer's bandage skill, the less chance of doing damage and the less damage will be done, however, so we should see less of this.

Excellent.

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Quote from: Dalmeth

I've come to the conclusion that relaxing is not the lack of doing anything, but doing something that comes easily to you.

this is great. The insta-heal effect was never realistic. the ability to spam cheapass bandages for full or nearly full heal was never realistic. this is a major fix to a feature that will overall improve gameplay and reduce silly code abuse. kudos!

If this works how I'm thinking, I like the idea that "anyone" can attempt to at least stabilize someone, and get them to someone with a better handle on things.

Maybe they take you to a magicker to heal you because they're the only one online. Maybe they don't. But its better than bleeding to death for 30minutes because nobody is online.

Yeah, as long as we are clear. Anyone can ATTEMPT to bandage but that's not to say they will be very good at it. It just means it will let you try!

Oh. Yeah. Absolutely, you aren't stabilizing someone in critical condition if you've been a dung shoveler your whole life, but who knows? Maybe with the right bandages and situation, you can at least stop them from dying.

I'm sure it hasn't happened OFTEN, but to be at negative HPs and you can only wait and hope the NPC doesn't kill you, or that your HP hits positive, is boring and nervewracking at the same time. At least with this, anyone CAN at least try to help, instead of borrowing a knife from John.

If your droog is laying there with their chest cracked open breathing their last, couldn't hurt to shove a few wads of bandages into the opening, pray one up to Shai-Hulud, and hope for the best. Fair chance you'll end up killing them. Might be that was going to happen, anyway.

Not sure if this is the proper place for feedback for this change, however...

Having played with this for the last couple of days, and having needed to be bandaged several times during those days, I do like how this is working much better than the old system. Haven't experienced any issues, yet.

Been toying with this some as of late. Sleeping seems more or less required with certain levels of wounded-ness (with lowest quality bandages, though) even at higher levels of skill. Will need to play with it more.

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Quote from: Is Friday

If you ever hassle me IC for not playing much that means that I'm going to play even less or I'll forever write you off as a neckbeard chained to his computer. So don't be a dick.